Catherine+Riga


 * SUMMARY: Catherine Riga, age 32, died April 1, 1921 after an abortion perpetrated by New York City abortionist Dr. Simeon Minden.**

On March 29, 1921, 57-year-old Dr. Simeon B. Minden performed an abortion in his New York City office on 32-year-old Mrs. Catherine Riga. Catherine died three days later at Lincoln Hospital. It took only two days for his trial, which ended in a conviction. Minden collapsed upon hearing the verdict.

A //New York Times// note card on Ancestry.com indicates that Minden was granted a new trial on May 18, 1922, and was pardoned by the governor after serving one year and four months of a 2.5 to 10-year sentence in Sing-Sing on December 12, 1924.

During the first two thirds of the 20th Century, while abortion was still illegal, there was a massive drop in maternal mortality, including mortality from abortion. Most researches attribute this plunge to improvements in public health and hygiene, the development of blood transfusion techniques, and the introduction of antibiotics. Learn more [|here].



For more on pre-legalization abortion, see [|The Bad Old Days of Abortion] .

Sources:
 * "Lay Her Death to Doctor", // New York Times //, Apr. 3, 1921;
 * "Physician Convicted for Operation", // New York Times //, Apr. 13, 1922
 * Sing Sing prison Receiving Blotter #75102



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